132 THE HORSE. 
forcible bearings forward, maintaining, increasing, or diminishing the 
momentum of speed, effectuated by throwing the hind feet as far forward 
underneath the body as possible, plunging them one after the other with 
inappreciable rapidity into the earth, and thus by two strenuous thrusts 
against the ground, one in aid of the other, working the animal machine 
in its fleet—almost flying—course. In the gallop as in the trot, no 
sooner is a certain momentum acquired, than by each successive propul- 
sion of the hind feet the body is sprung or lifted off the ground, flying 
as it appears in the air, and the greater the speed, the more this volitation 
becomes apparent. Hence the appellation given to the pace, manifestly 
the utmost speed, of rLyin¢ GALLop. Even this, however, according to 
my judgment, is an action different from leaping. When a horse leaps or 
jumps in his gallop,—which he will do sometimes when he is beany and 
has but just emerged out of his stable,—he is said to buck, because his 
action then resembles that of the deer, in whom the gallop might with a 
great deal more propriety be called a succession of leaps: even the deer, 
however, cannot continue this bucking action after being driven into his 
speed, or in a state of fatigue, showing that in him it is to be regarded 
rather as a gambol than as his proper working onward action. And that 
the hind and fore feet in pairs are not grounded synchronously, I think 
admits of a demonstration in two ways: first, by the position they assume 
one in advance of the other in the gallop; secondly, by the clatter the 
steps of a horse in the gallop are known to make upon hard or resonant 
ground, and which may be heard either by a spectator or by the rider 
himself. Whence we probably derive the phrase, a rattling gallop.” 
But while I agree with Mr. Percivall that there is a difference between 
the act of leaping and galloping, as performed by the horse, I do not 
quite see that it is an abuse of terms to describe the gallop as a “succes- 
sion of leaps”—that they are not precisely similar to those made in over- 
coming an obstacle does not necessarily make them other than leaps. The 
word leap is not defined in our dictionaries so as to confine its meaning 
beyond that appertaining to its synonym, spring, and probably even Mr. 
Perceval would not deny that in the gallop, the horse, as well as the deer, 
makes a succession of springs. The dispute is founded, as is so often the 
case, upon a want of agreement as to the meaning of a word, and not on 
a difference of opinion as to the essence of the act itself. Blaine, Perceval, 
and every careful observer of the horse in action, well know that in the 
act of galloping the horse leaves the print of his hind feet one in ad- 
vance of the other, while in leaping he generally, in fact almost invariably, 
makes them opposite one another. ‘There is a contradiction apparent in 
Perceval’s remarks about the deer’s gallop, which in one place he observes 
‘might with a great deal more propriety be called a succession of leaps,” 
while in the next sentence he says that this “ bucking action” in the deer 
“is to be regarded rather as a gambol than as his proper working onward 
action.” The deer’s gallop very closely resembles that of the horse, but 
as he is a stronger and higher leaper, especially in proportion to his size, 
he can continue those bounds with the hind legs opposite each other 
much longer and with more advantage than the horse, who seldom makes 
more than two or three in succession. 
To REPRESENT THE GALLOP pictorially in a perfectly correct manner is 
almost impossible. At all events it has never yet been accomplished, the 
ordinary and received interpretation being altogether erroneous. When 
carefully watched, the horse in full gallop will be seen to extend himself 
very much, but not nearly to the length which is assigned to him by 
